Bill C-24 (Historical)

Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act

An Act to amend the Citizenship Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Citizenship Act to, among other things, update eligibility requirements for Canadian citizenship, strengthen security and fraud provisions and amend provisions governing the processing of applications and the review of decisions.
Amendments to the eligibility requirements include
(a) clarifying the meaning of being resident in Canada;
(b) modifying the period during which a permanent resident must reside in Canada before they may apply for citizenship;
(c) expediting access to citizenship for persons who are serving in, or have served in, the Canadian Armed Forces;
(d) requiring that an applicant for citizenship demonstrate, in one of Canada’s official languages, knowledge of Canada and of the responsibilities and privileges of citizenship;
(e) specifying the age as of which an applicant for citizenship must demonstrate the knowledge referred to in paragraph (d) and must demonstrate an adequate knowledge of one of Canada’s official languages;
(f) requiring that an applicant meet any applicable requirement under the Income Tax Act to file a return of income;
(g) conferring citizenship on certain individuals and their descendants who may not have acquired citizenship under prior legislation;
(h) extending an exception to the first-generation limit to citizenship by descent to children born to or adopted abroad by parents who were themselves born to or adopted abroad by Crown servants; and
(i) requiring, for a grant of citizenship for an adopted person, that the adoption not have circumvented international adoption law.
Amendments to the security and fraud provisions include
(a) expanding the prohibition against granting citizenship to include persons who are charged outside Canada for an offence that, if committed in Canada, would constitute an indictable offence under an Act of Parliament or who are serving a sentence outside Canada for such an offence;
(b) expanding the prohibition against granting citizenship to include persons who, while they were permanent residents, engaged in certain actions contrary to the national interest of Canada, and permanently barring those persons from acquiring citizenship;
(c) aligning the grounds related to security and organized criminality on which a person may be denied citizenship with those grounds in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and extending the period during which a person is barred from acquiring citizenship on that basis;
(d) expanding the prohibition against granting citizenship to include persons who, in the course of their application, misrepresent material facts and prohibiting new applications by those persons for a specified period;
(e) increasing the period during which a person is barred from applying for citizenship after having been convicted of certain offences;
(f) increasing the maximum penalties for offences related to citizenship, including fraud and trafficking in documents of citizenship;
(g) providing for the regulation of citizenship consultants;
(h) establishing a hybrid model for revoking a person’s citizenship in which the Minister will decide the majority of cases and the Federal Court will decide the cases related to inadmissibility based on security grounds, on grounds of violating human or international rights or on grounds of organized criminality;
(i) increasing the period during which a person is barred from applying for citizenship after their citizenship has been revoked;
(j) providing for the revocation of citizenship of dual citizens who, while they were Canadian citizens, engaged in certain actions contrary to the national interest of Canada, and permanently barring these individuals from reacquiring citizenship; and
(k) authorizing regulations to be made respecting the disclosure of information.
Amendments to the provisions governing the processing of applications and the review of decisions include
(a) requiring that an application must be complete to be accepted for processing;
(b) expanding the grounds and period for the suspension of applications and providing for the circumstances in which applications may be treated as abandoned;
(c) limiting the role of citizenship judges in the decision-making process, subject to the Minister periodically exercising his or her power to continue the period of application of that limitation;
(d) giving the Minister the power to make regulations concerning the making and processing of applications;
(e) providing for the judicial review of any matter under the Act and permitting, in certain circumstances, further appeals to the Federal Court of Appeal; and
(f) transferring to the Minister the discretionary power to grant citizenship in special cases.
Finally, the enactment makes consequential amendments to the Federal Courts Act and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

Business of the House

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have another opportunity to respond to the Thursday question from the hon. member for Burnaby—New Westminster.

I know how proud he claims to be about showing up to work. In fact, though, the New Democrats seem to have a spotty record on that. Last evening, that very member rose to speak to our government's bill to protect our communities and exploited persons—that is Bill C-36—and after one whole minute he moved to adjourn the House. He said we should all go home. Maybe that is the parliamentary equivalent of taking one's ball and wanting to go home when one is unhappy with how things are going in another meeting.

In any event, we did all dutifully troop into the House to vote on that at 6 p.m. However, what was very revealing was that only 61 of those 98 New Democrats stood in their places to vote. A few of them were missing their shifts, oddly. We did not find that on the Conservative side. In fact, we just had two votes in the House, and the number of New Democrats who were not standing in their places was very similar to that.

Therefore, when I ask myself who is not showing up for work, I can say it is not the Conservatives not showing up; it is, in fact, the New Democrats.

However, following the popular acclaim of last week's Thursday statement, I would like to recap what we have actually accomplished in the House since last week in terms of the legislative agenda.

Bill C-37, the riding name change act, 2014, which was compiled and assembled through the input of all parties, was introduced and adopted at all stages.

Bill C-31, the economic action plan, act no. 1, was adopted at both report stage and, just moments ago, at third reading.

Bill C-24, the strengthening Canadian citizenship act, was concurred in at report stage.

Bill C-20, the Canada-Honduras economic growth and prosperity act, was passed at third reading. Of course, the NDP tried to slow down its passage, but Conservatives were able to get around those efforts, as I am sure the 50 New Democrats on vigil in the House last night fondly appreciate, and we were able to extend our hours because there were, again, not even 50 New Democrats here in the House to stand in their places to block that debate as they wanted to. So we did finish the Canada-Honduras bill that night, and were able to vote on it.

The government's spending proposals for the year were adopted by the House, and two bills to give these plans effect, Bill C-38 and BillC-39, were each passed at all stages.

Bill C-22, the energy safety and security act, was reported back from committee, and several other reports from committees were also tabled. As I understand, we will see Bill C-17, the protecting Canadians from unsafe drugs act, reported back from the health committee in short order.

Finally, this morning we virtually unanimously passed a motion to reappoint Mary Dawson as our Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner.

Sadly, though, the New Democrats did not heed my call last week to let Bill C-32, the victims bill of rights act, pass at second reading. We were treated, sadly, to only more words and no deeds from the NDP.

Turning to the business ahead, I am currently anticipating the following debates. This afternoon and tonight, we will finish the debate on Bill C-36, the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act, at second reading. That will be followed by third reading of Bill C-24 and second reading of Bill C-35, Justice for Animals in Service Act (Quanto's Law).

Tomorrow morning, we will debate Bill C-24, if necessary, and Bill C-18, Agricultural Growth Act, at second reading. After question period, we will get back to Bill C-32, and give the NDP one more chance to send the victims bill of rights to committee.

The highlight of Monday is going to be the report stage of Bill C-6, the Prohibiting Cluster Munitions Act. Tuesday’s feature debate will be Bill C-2, the Respect for Communities Act, at second reading. Wednesday will see us finish third reading, I hope, of Bill C-6. During the additional time available those days—in addition to Thursday and Friday of next week—I will schedule any unfinished debates on Bill C-18, Bill C-32 and Bill C-35.

I will also try to schedule debates on Bill C-22 and Bill C-17, as well as other bills, such as Bill C-3, the Safeguarding Canada’s Seas and Skies Act, at third reading; Bill C-8, the Combating Counterfeit Products Act, at third reading; Bill C-12, the Drug-free Prisons Act, at second reading; Bill C-21, Red Tape Reduction Act, at second reading; Bill C-26, Tougher Penalties for Child Predators Act, at second reading; Bill S-2, Incorporation by Reference in Regulations Act, at second reading; Bill S-3, the Port State Measures Agreement Implementation Act, at second reading; and Bill S-4, the Digital Privacy Act—which I understand we will receive shortly from the other place—at second reading.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the minister went on TV and claimed that Bill C-24 would respect Canada's charter because it is consistent with other NATO countries.

Can the minister please explain how NATO has anything to do with charter protections for Canadian citizens?

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the minister really will say anything to evade taking responsibility for his failures. He goes out into the media daily, where he only succeeds in making himself look even worse. The minister even went on TV and claimed that Bill C-24 would respect Canada's charter because it is consistent with other NATO countries.

Can the minister explain—

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the second petition is with respect to Bill C-24, the amendment to the Citizenship Act. These petitioners are concerned that it treats Canadian permanent residents who came to Canada as temporary workers and international students who have spent a considerable amount of time here and wish to have that time counted toward their citizenship unfairly. They are of great economic benefit and the petitioners want the government to amend the Citizenship Act to recognize the contribution that these citizens make.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thanks for those questions.

On citizenship, wait times are not growing. They are, in our view, unacceptably high—two to three years—but they are starting to come down as we move through a much larger number of cases. Already this year we have gotten through 100,000 in the first five months, and with the measures in Bill C-24, we will get through them at a much faster rate in the second half of this year. This means that by early 2016, wait times for citizenship applications will be under one year once again.

For temporary resident visas, which we are issuing in record numbers around the world, in the first three months of this year, demand was up 30% in China, our biggest market, if you will. We issue well over a million every year.

We are put to the test to meet this demand, to stay within our 14-day service standard. I haven't checked the numbers this week, but as recently as early this month and late last month, we were within those service standards, and in many parts of the world, including China, we were well below them.

As you know, we announced CAN+, a service for Mexico and other countries whose visitor visas are processed in Mexico City by us. It will ensure that a large class of visitors from Mexico will have service in seven days or less.

We're also issuing, in some missions, a record number—as much as 90% or more—of multiple-entry visas, 10-year multiple-entry visas, which means that Chinese citizens, Indian citizens, and Mexican citizens, in unprecedented numbers, are coming and going as they see fit to visit family members or to do business. That's a very positive and popular measure, but we've really accelerated it in this past fiscal year, and we plan to continue to do so as our trade relations, economic relations, and tourism with all of these countries continue to grow.

[Devinder Shory, Conservative, Calgary Northeast, AB]

Quickly, Minister, I want to thank you once again for having my portion of Bill C-425 adopted into Bill C-24.

There was a question today on why we did not introduce this kind of bill before, and I want to remind everyone that it was the opposition who stalled the portion of this bill that I introduced last year. It's the government or individual members who have been trying to fix the broken system.

Thank you, Minister.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thank you.

The U.K. and the United States have five-year requirements. Other countries in Europe have even longer requirements. Australia has a four-year requirement, which will be the same as ours if and when Bill C-24 becomes law. So we are absolutely in the right ballpark.

In my contact with Canadians, the strongest proponents of this four-year residency requirement are newcomers themselves. They see some of the abuse, and they saw it in recent decades. They want to have that sense of knowledge, that direct experience, and be well oriented in Canada as a society. That does take time. Four years is a reasonable amount of time. In fact 45% of those applying for citizenship already spent four years or more here before they applied.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

It was your colleagues in the House of Commons today who were making a distinction between naturalized and native-born Canadians with regard to one aspect of Bill C-24. We make no such distinction. We expect and celebrate the fact that Canadians, whatever their origin, love this country; participate fully in its civic, political, economic, cultural life; and are very strong and very numerous in supporting us in increasing the residency requirement by one year, because you cannot develop, if you haven't lived here before, that connection to Canada, that sense of belonging, that knowledge of Canada, experience of Canada, except by being physically present here.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Thank you, Ms. Blanchette-Lamothe.

Mr. Minister, you mentioned in your opening remarks that the previous Liberal government had left a broken immigration system, with people waiting over eight years.

I agree with you that it was a broken immigration system that needed to be fixed, sure, so my question to you is pretty simple. You also talked about Bill C-24 and thanked the committee. With respect to Bill C-24 making it harder for people to get citizenship in Canada, and with the previous Liberal government's backlogs, delays, and whatever—the broken immigration system, as you mentioned—why has it taken your government so long to actually do anything about it? It's been over three years now that this Parliament has been in session. Why has it taken you so long to actually do something about it?

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thank you so much, Mr. Leung, and thank you for your work on this committee, on its reports, and on Bill C-24.

The simple answer to your question is twofold. First, we are getting faster processing already, thanks to budgetary commitments and money in these estimates. We did have some years, last year and the previous years, when residency concerns were widespread, when residency questionnaires were distributed in relatively large numbers. That scrutiny was required, as you said, because there was abuse. But we've overcome many of those obstacles. We've put in place new resources to process more, and in the first five months of this year, over 100,000 permanent residents became citizens of Canada, which is a record number.

I hope that all members of this committee have had the opportunity to participate in a citizenship ceremony recently.

The bill will give us even more tools to press ahead with this faster processing. It simplifies the decision-making model and will allow us to use the resources you are voting on today in these main estimates, and which we are discussing today, to greater effect. It will literally help us make tens of thousands more permanent residents citizens this year than we would be able to do were the bill not passed, or passed much later.

In addition to faster processing, in addition to reinforcing the value of citizenship and lengthening the residency requirement slightly, we will have new tools to maintain program integrity and combat fraud, which should prevent us from having the kinds of doubts hanging over this program that we've had in the past.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Mr. Leung, I know the minister may have opened the door when he started talking about Bill C-24, but we're here to talk about estimates as to expenditures, and Bill C-24 is not law, so unless you're using that as a preamble to something—

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Minister, and staff for attending.

Immigration is probably one of the greatest hallmarks of Canada's history in our nation-building and how we've evolved and where we are today.

Minister, you spoke about Bill C-24, strengthening Canadian citizenship act. We know that the Liberals had 13 long comfortable years to reform the Citizenship Act, but they didn't do it. That's why our government set out to make the first comprehensive reform to the Citizenship Act in 35 years; that's since 1977.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Of course, Mr. Chair.

I apologize for having been late and for having made life difficult for the interpreters.

We have admitted as immigrants an average of more than a quarter of a million newcomers to Canada each year since 2006, as the committee well knows.

We're taking action to further strengthen the pride that Canadians take in citizenship, the value of citizenship in this country, with the first comprehensive reforms to the act since 1977. We do this, in contrast to the previous Liberal record, by cracking down on fraud, demanding and promoting greater attachment to Canada, and speeding up processing for eligible applicants.

This new funding will result in improved processing times and overall service. Combined with the efficiency measures proposed in the strengthening Canadian citizenship act, we will see processing times for citizenship applications come down to one year or less by the end of 2015-16.

I would like to take the opportunity to thank committee members for all their hard work on Bill C-24—the pre-study, the clause-by-clause, etc. As you all know, it passed second reading last week and report stage this week. We're very close, one step away, at least in House of Commons terms, from turning this bill into law.

Another $35.5 million in funding represents an increase to the grant for the Canada-Quebec Accord in 2014-15 and future years to meet our obligations under the accord.

As you know, the Canada-Quebec Accord gives the Government of Quebec exclusive responsibility for settlement and integration services in the province in return for financial compensation from the Government of Canada.

You may recall that the grant amount for 2013-2014 for Quebec for the settlement and integration of immigrants and refugees was $320 million. This includes the base amount of $284.5 million, plus an increase of $35.5 million based, in part, on the number of non-francophone immigrants settling in that province.

As a result, CIC's main estimates are now increasing by $35.5 million on an ongoing basis, starting this fiscal year, to reflect the updated grant of $320 million.

My department's main estimates for this year also include an increase of just over $13 million to develop and implement the electronic travel authorization, or eTA, under the Canada-U.S. perimeter security and economic competitiveness action plan. This is a low-cost, quick, and easy-to-use online application process that will allow us to screen visitors from all countries who do not require a visa to enter Canada and who travel by air, with the exception of citizens of the United States.

When the eTA is implemented, in 2015, we'll be able to screen most visitors before they board a plane to verify whether they pose a risk to Canada, or to the health, safety, and security of Canadians. Resolving issues prior to a traveller's arrival at a port of entry will enhance security, improve border efficiencies, reduce the need for removals and returns, and facilitate the movement of legitimate travellers. We are closely working with our partners at CBSA, and with the airline sector, to ensure the smooth rollout of this initiative in 2015-16.

For the first time in the main estimates, you will also see a line item for the passport program revolving fund, which was transferred last year from the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development, along with allocations for International Experience Canada, which was also transferred.

In addition to the items I have already mentioned, funding increases in CIC's main estimates also include $4.2 million to meet our commitments under the roadmap for Canada's official languages.

These include promotion and recruitment activities in Canada and abroad; language training and other settlement services for French-speaking newcomers; and immigration research and knowledge-sharing projects of interest to both francophone minority communities and English-speaking communities in Quebec.

Mr. Chair, these and other increases are offset by a number of funding decreases in the estimates. The previous Liberal government left an immigration system with serious shortcomings. That resulted in potential immigrants putting lives on hold, waiting for up to eight years for an answer. This is something our government didn't accept, and we are endeavouring to do better.

That is why—

[Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe, NDP, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, a few weeks ago, the minister had to apologize to an immigration consultant whose name he unfairly dragged through the mud. The minister also attacked the Canadian Bar Association for its position on Bill C-24, and yesterday, he went after Toronto constitutional expert Rocco Galati, who was another victim of the minister's mood swings.

Why is the minister ignoring or attacking everyone who does not agree with him? Does he not realize that this attitude, which is typical of the Conservatives, is completely ridiculous and inappropriate?

[Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe, NDP, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the minister no longer knows what to say to salvage his credibility.

A number of experts, including the Canadian Bar Association, believe that the citizenship bill is unconstitutional. Yesterday, in a CBC interview, the minister dismissed the criticism, saying that Bill C-24 is similar to what is being done in other NATO countries, but what does NATO have to do with a debate on access to Canadian citizenship? It is completely ridiculous.

Will our fundamental rights in Canada now depend on the mood of our NATO allies?